Bisky's Twitterling's Scribbles! discussion

@Bisky - Red socks and red hair!! @w@ lol

@Kamil - So you wrote more violet stories, too--I wonder if it's in human instinct to be violent? o.O An old co-worker of mine tried writing for a while, he wrote something very very violent, too... scary o.O lol

I think its because we want to think of villans as being 'the most evil' which includes the acts of horrendous violence. Because it is unimaginable it is more believeable :3

@Bisky, the acts of violence were done by the good guys in my case

anti hero :3

I love anti-heroes. :3 My character's halfway between a hero and anti-hero. She has some guilt on her shoulders. But in my old stories, the violence was done mostly by the bad people, but my main character was kind of dark at the beginning. When I reboot that story, I'm going to make the character a goodie-good guy whose going to be a 4th year veterinarian student and engaged to his girlfriend and have him kind of go downhill. :3

Carl wrote: "Anthologies are a great way to study literature because readers peruse excerpts by multiple writers."

MM wrote: "Rewriting my first chapter and having a headache. I tried starting in action, I was told it was confusing. I tried having an amazing hook, I was told it sounded too much like a prologue. I tried ju..."

@MM I too am struggling with my first page.*sigh*
Originally I jumped right into the action which I believe is called in media res, because I enjoy reading books that throw you into the fray. But after receiving feedback from an agent telling me I needed to work on story structure I am trying begin my story before the inciting incident so that I can establish the norm and let the reader see my character's life before it goes up in smoke, ash, and hurling high heels. So far I have come up with four alternative first pages and first chapters and they're all complete crap. So yeah hang in there and hopefully you and I both will wade our way out of this funk.

Annalisa wrote: "Nicole wrote: "You know what's pissing me off? All this series, trilogy, Book 1 shit. I am over it. Can't you just write *A* book anymore? I have to have a series of 6 books because that is somehow..."

@Nicole I understand where you're coming from from a readers perspective. I've actually turned books down at the book store when seeing that there are more than three of them in the series. Three is great when the story truly needs all that time to be told. As a writer though half way through the first draft of my first MS I knew my story was bigger than one book and started planning for the trilogy. Sometimes it simply a matter of bleeding the readers out of all you've got making you buy six books at three hundred pages each instead of two or three with larger page counts. In the end its about the money and that's rarely what is on a true unpublished writer's mind when they begin a book.

I had the same trouble with my debut. Halfway through I realised there was more story to tell, but if I'd tried to squeeze it into one book it would have made what overarching theme there was messy & possibly confusing.

@Shelby - In media res is right. :3 While your character's in the norm, you could still stir in some conflict that frustrates her typical, typical norm. Like a typical everyday conflict.

One of your posts was posted like 3 times in a row, so I removed the 2 duplicates--sometimes the Internet likes to do dumb things. :)

@Deb - Sometimes you just have to 'kill your darlings.' :/

New problem: I am having trouble reading. :-| Like, I critique everything I read now. I can't concentrate on the story because I am too busy yelling 'RESIST THE URGE TO EXPLAIN! YOU JUST USED THAT WORD ON THE PREVIOUS PAGE! YOU DON'T EVEN NEED THIS PARAGRAPH!"

HELP ME. :(

I sometimes have that problem, too. D8

I just keep reading and try to brush off the annoyance. Remind yourself it's entirely pleasure reading. :3

Go back and read something your really proud of and remember how awesome you are Nicole!

I'll probably do the same thing! "WHO WROTE THIS GARBAGE? Oh wait..." LOL ;)

Get some wine in ya, girl. I'm having that atm with the query I sent after pitmad yesterday.

*Is sliently dying inside*

But they have chapter three of Vermillion... its ok its awesome! *breathes*

Just go find your favourite character and snuggle with them for a while :3

Nicole wrote: "New problem: I am having trouble reading. :-| Like, I critique everything I read now. I can't concentrate on the story because I am too busy yelling 'RESIST THE URGE TO EXPLAIN! YOU JUST USED THAT ..."

Hi Nicole - the same thing happened to me after I wrote my first book. I started to see all the flaws! Before, I would just whisk past them. Over time, it has gotten a little better, but you will probably never be able to go back all the way. MK

Nicole wrote: "You know what's pissing me off? All this series, trilogy, Book 1 shit. I am over it. Can't you just write *A* book anymore? I have to have a series of 6 books because that is somehow the magic numb..."
I made that mistake too. And Crap, if I was starting all over again, I'd have just made one really long book, in fact when I get done with my little trilogy, which will be my last, I'm going to repackage the whole thing as one big book, it might be around 300,000 words, but I think that would still be shorter most of the Game of Thrones books... and After that it's just single books, because you'r right there are far too many of these trilogy/six part series out here for independent authors and we need to quit it.

Josh wrote: "Take a literature class at your university. :D

From what I've taken so far, the British Lit. classes seem a tad more difficult--because British Lit. goes wayyyy back more than American Lit--so th..."

Oh come on I read the Canterbury Tales in high school... of course I had a really good teacher who snuck all the dirty stories into our private catholic school (Everyone in the class still calls him the best teacher we ever had)

So... here's my problem. I'm really not sure if what I'm writing right now is inspired or completely insane. I have a single chapter that's broken into fifteen sub-chapters with seven or eight separate viewpoints. My goal is to propel the story forward by bouncing through different viewpoints that see different things and keeping each viewpoint short so no one gets too sidetracked. I kind of did it through the first two books of my Rock Series, but I used short chapters, instead of sub chapters, now I'm going sub-chapter crazy. It reads lightning quick, but it's very unconventional in novels, it's more like a climactic movie scene, and it is a climactic scene in the book, but I'm just unsure of what people might think of it... ugh...

Post it online for critque? It really helped me get the first chapter of A Dance With Fury how i wanted it. It ened up changing alot.

It's not the writing I'm worried about, just the concept... I did it in the first chapter, which is in the end of the Singer already, so I could post it...but where?

Don't you have a blog? :] Also I use Issuu to post things online so they are easier to read

Uh...yeah I do in fact have a blog, I'll throw it up as a post tomorrow, it's 2am here so I'm kinda sleepy...

As per our discussion Bisky here is the link to the first chapter of The Stage:

http://rockhardpress.com/?p=840

Please let me know if I have a problem, or if it reads ok.
And Please anyone else check it out and tell me what you think. I have thick skin, so please be honest, while I still have time to fix thing in editing.

@Rick - We read the old English versions. The teacher also gave as a copy with more modern English, but she asked us to read the old English version first. We read some of the tales in high school, too, but it was int he more modern English. :3

Josh I don't remember which version it was only that some of the stories were pretty funny

http://rockhardpress.com/?p=840

The above link is to the first chapter of the book I'm working on right now. I'm not sure if I have a problem with it, or if it's readable, so if someone could take a look and let me know what they think I would greatly appreciate it.

Shelby wrote: ...see my character's life before it goes up in smoke, ash, and hurling high heels. "

Sounds interesting.
I would love to read it.

@ Rick

I will read it and give you my thoughts. Sounds like you have an interesting idea with the sub-chapters. I like out-of-the-ordinary stuff.

Thank You MM! I'll look forward to your comments.

I hate that I have to beg people to read my books. Being a writer is tainted with desperation.

Thank You MM for taking the time to read the chapter I posted, I really appreciate your comments which will help me as I go to edit. If there is anything at all I can do for you, just let me know.

Shelby, I don't know why but I can read a series opener and stop if I don't care for it. My attitude is that the book's okay but not worth going on to book two. Maybe the why is that I love to read series to see how characters change. Sadly, some series lose stream as they go. Hunger Games book one is pretty good but book three is awful for reasons other have noted. A series I read last winter holds up throughout--Vampire Academy. Another series got boring but revived--Dune.

I remember reading advice for writers that if you get bored then your readers probably do too.

I'd add lazy to that. Twilight is an excellent example b/c Meyer, at the end, gives Bella everything she wants. Contrast that with Rowling's HP which begins with Harry as an orphan who lives with abusive and neglectful aunt and uncle.

Thus, series can expand or diminish a writer's world. I wonder if badly written series result from poor planning--no story arc. Thoughts?

I often think its from poor planning. My first is part of a series and I know basically what all three are going to be like. You mentioned Twilight and I remember hearing her on the BBC mention that she never intended to make it so long, probably why it was so fluffy.

Having said that I never really believed that the ending of HP was the original intended ending. So many loose ends. More evidence for this is her want to do a 'directors cut' of the book. Sad that she was so pressured really.

I'm not sure if I should try to write another House novella or Winner novella. Either way, it seems my stand alones are evolving into series...

Bisky, interesting bit about Rowling. I suppose a best-seller seems editors screaming for a series. I don't blame authors who go for big $. Anybody who gets paid to write deserves it.

*sends* editors.

Nicole, I figure that what works best is the organic approach. If a story grows into a novel and a novel grows into a series because it ought then it's no problem. You're the goddess in your writing world. :-)

Pulling my hair out over writing this blurb.

Post it somewhere here, make a thread in the story folder if you want some critque :]

Mostly what kills me is that there's a lot of contradictory advice out there... and ultimately it seems to boil down to "a good blurb is the blurb I point at when I point at a blurb and say it's good."

I wasn't sure about mine but Ive only had positive feedback, I think its just getting it out there and seeing what people say :3

Update on my problem: I chose the House series for now... and with coming up with a second book... I came up with a third and fourth too!!! When it rains it pours I guess!

Yay, you found the fountain of ideas! lol

I have a problem, too, somewhat.

I have a limited third person narrator. So if the character my narrator follows is drunk, would the narrator be drunk, too? Or would the narrator remain sober but still know what's going through the character's intoxicated mind?

Depends on the tense,

"I'm not exactly sure whats going on. The ground is really fuzzy."

"I wasn't sure what was going on. To me, the ground looked fuzzy."

What came to my mind :3

(the irony is if I've made no sense, Im alittle tipsy myself right now :p)

You made sense haha. I'm going to save that word tipsy for this scene. haha

It would be much easier if it were first person, but I doubt I could pull off a female first person narrator. xD

But I guess the narrator doesn't have to a person following a character around, either. Let's say every person has a video tape in their heads. My book could be what's recorded on the tape. The narrator is reciting the tape... Nelly's eyes are the cameras and her ears and thoughts make up the audio...

I don't know. lol

ADWF is first person, past tense from the view of the female MC. Though, I played with a few chapters in present tense. It was nice but I couldn't do a whole book like that.

"I take a drag of my cigarette and watch the smoke flow out into the night air."

"I took a drag of my cigarette letting the smoke flow out into the night air."

Vermillion is third person, past tense.

"After he took a drag, he let the smoke out into the night air."

Which tense are you doing it in? Im confused (wine)

I'm using the past tense with limited third person. :3

My problem is determining what the narrator knows and doesn't know. lol If Nelly's drunk, does the narrator still see what's happening clearly around her, or is he drunk, too? But then I thought of that video tape concept earlier. lol - I'm confusing myself now. lol

I'm waiting for you to give me an example :p

This scene doesn't happen until around 11,000 words in. xD "The point of no return" area.

I'm actually transcribing the edits I made for the first chapter on paper into Scrivener. :3 My goal is to get it posted in a couple weeks.

I managed to get a couple free hours. I've been kind of sick the past week, so I drew instead. I got tired of coloring what others had drawn for me, so I drew my own stuff. haha

Dunno why you're getting other people to draw it for you anyways you're really good :]

I misspelled you're twice in once post. Goreammit.

Thanks :3 When I draw something I think looks decent, in a month it looks horrible. I like to have posters of my characters in my room, and I have other people draw them so they don't 'deteriorate' over time. It's similar how I don't like to look at the writing I did in the first half of 2013 or earlier. lol

That's okay haha. Forum posts aren't going to be seen by editors. xD